Written Works and Graphic Art From Half A Step Over

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August 1st is the deadline for submissions to the 2014/2015 edition of NovoPulp. At that time submissions will be prepared for publication at the end of the year. As we over ran our deadline last time I brought the deadline back a month to give us more time.

However since we have had difficulties getting artwork this year I have decided to extend the Art Submission deadline to September 1st so that #SciFiAugust contributors can submit their artwork if they want to. If I have been in touch with you on Google+ over the year about artwork for NovoPulp and you are still interested in getting involved then now is the time to do it! If it is easier for you to submit your work via email you can do so, but we still need you send us the same details as requested on the form. Failure to do so may result in delayed publication of your work.

If you are a writer and want to get involved for the 2014/2015 edition you only have one month left to submit your work. You can of course submit after this deadline, but it will be considered for the 2015/2016 edition instead.

Now that NovoPulp has published it’s first anthology, full of stories and artwork by G+ authors and artists, we wanted to reflect on how far we have come over the past year. I asked all our contributors if they had any feedback and here are what a few of them had to say:

“For me, the process of working on Novo Pulp was one of inches. Micha would ask “Do you have time to edit this one story.” I’d agree. Then another story. When I found out I had edited roughly half the book, you could have knocked me over with a feather.” – Charles Barouch, Editor and Writer for NovoPulp

“Being a part of NovoPulp has been a great experience for me. Working with talented people whose dedication to bringing this genre to a new audience has been an inspiration in my own writing. As someone who has been writing and editing for more than four decades, it was refreshing to see how enthusiastic Niamh, Micha, Ted, Daniela, and the rest were about NovoPulp. I’m looking forward to working with them in the years to come.” – H. David Blalock, Editor and Writer for NovoPulp

“Bringing a project like this to life is far more complex than we’d imagined at the start. I am incredibly proud of, and grateful to, everyone who gave of themselves, their time, and their talents to make this dream a reality. They say, ‘Begin as you mean to go on’ and this first volume is an outstanding foundation for what is yet to come. Twenty years from now, we will look back and say: ‘I was there as we laid the first stones.'” – Ted Ewen, Founder of NovoPulp

For me it has been a wonderful and eyeopening experience. I have been at the center of NovoPulp since January 2013, when we moved over to the public Google+ community. The team came together with the right people at the right time. When we had an obsticale everyone pulled together and we found a way through. I have also been very impressed with the quality of the stories, artwork, editing, typesetting, graphic design, and everything else that was poured into the project by our contributors. I can’t wait to see how NovoPulp is going to grow in the future and what I’m going to learn next. This whole process has given me the kick I needed to get serious about self publishing.

For images and code you can put on your website visit our Spread the Word page (note: this has been updated recently so you might want to check if you have the lastest version).

BIG thanks to all our contributors, we could not have done it without you all. We hope this draws the recognition that the contributors deserve. If you enjoy speculative fiction and great artwork you are in for a treat.

So please come and join us in the first NovoPulp Launch Party HOA this weekend (the 29th/30th of March 2014 – depending on your time zone).

On September 1st 2013 the first NovoPulp deadline will be over and submissions will be prepared for publication at the end of the year. Looking back at the last post dedicated to NovoPulp on Hermit Studio Press, NovoPulp Has Moved To Google+ for 2013, I can see it was published back in January 2013. A lot has happened since then and with the 2013 edition deadline looming I thought it would be nice to do a little round up of what we have achieved so far:

We created a public Google+ Community for those who want to learn more and support the project, even if you can’t get involved directly.

We created the foundation for the NovoPulp Websitefor handling submissions and providing information on the project. We have updated this through-out the year with new features and pages such as We Need You, Showcaseand Spread the Word. (This is only a humble beginning, we have big plans for the future.)

We have created a Fundrazr for donations to support our Google+ indie authors and artists, as well as to help cover the first-time costs of getting the NovoPulp project up-and-running.

At the time of writing we have received 10 stories and, after editing, the current word count totals 33,130.

We have also received 3 art/photography submissions to be included.

Finally we have just created a NovoPulp mailing listfor anyone who wants to get updates on the anthology production and release.

If you want to get involved for the 2013 edition you only have one month left to submit your work. You can of course submit after this deadline, but it will be considered for the 2014 edition instead. If you can’t wait until the 2013 edition is out then remember to subscribe to the NovoPulp mailing list and we will keep you up-to-date with all things NovoPulp.

I recently started work on a new book about productivity, which I call the ‘Bite-sized Blitz’. During the process of forming the idea behind it I have come to realise that, without knowing it, I had a huge passion for productivity. I am always looking for ways to be more productive in the fast pace age I find myself in, but it took me a while to realise I had enough knowledge to write about it regularly. I wrote one productivity piece about 5 years ago calledDistributed Organizational Tools, but nothing much since except in my day job as a Web developer. I have tried many more tools and methodologies since than, so I realised I had enough material to fill a productivity blog.

Although the Bite-sized Blitz blog shares the same name with my book, it will have one difference. This blog will be about sharing the full range of my productivity experience, as well as trying out new methodologies, ideas and tools for improvement. Where the blog will tie together with my book is the idea behind the name Bite-sized Blitz, which is about dealing with big things in bite-sized chunks. Over the years I have brought a number of productivity ideas together in order to deal with a heavy workload whilst managing chronic health issues. I have learned how to pace myself and still get far more done than I had ever thought possible before 2012. I have seen such an improvement in my stress levels as a result so now it’s time for me to share what I’ve learned.

I am working on setting up the blog website, my first attempt about a week ago has gone wrong so I have to start again. I decided in the meantime to create the Bite-sized Blitz newsletter to support the blog, book and to give a way free productivity documents and cheat sheets. So if you would like to be updated with news about the blog and my new book please subscribe to the Bite-sized Blitz mailing list.

Since we moved from the UK to Denmark in 2008 we have been using our collective writing skills to help proofread English copy for non-native English speakers. We realised that we could open up the service through the studio website for both the local Danish & Expat market; and anyone else who would like the peace of mind.

Since work began on the 2013 NovoPulp Google+ Speculative Fiction Anthology, and the website began development, we have come to know a great bunch of people. They have acted like a ‘talent mirror’ so we could hold our own work up in order to reflect a more impartial view. We individually gain practical feedback in a supportive and safe manner to help us all make the next step towards NovoPulp indie stardom!

The first piece I submitted to NovoPulp was my short story The Cancer. It was interesting to see what issues cropped up as, in the end, they seemed more structural than grammatical. So since the standard of our writing was improving, it was only logical that the next step for Hermit Studio was to codify our English proofreading services for the benefit of our network.

This is just a quick post to say we are looking to get the NovoPulp project up and running in 2013 as a purely Google+ endeavour. We believe that: Yes there is enough indie talent on Google+ alone to compile an annual anthology.

We had started up a set of forums last year, under the impression we couldn’t confine ourselves to Google+ alone. We had started the forum to attract people from other social networks, but it turned out the group came exclusively from Google+ and stayed that way. With the addition of Google+ Communities it made sense to move us back to Google+ and get the project going again after a recent enquiry got the NovoPulp conversation rolling. Since the forums went quiet toward the end of the summer in 2012 I have seen so much more creatively from Google+ Authors than from any other social outlet and we wish to do our bit to keep Google+ers ahead of the curve.

In addition to our goal of promoting people on Google+ we have opened up another angle on the project. To provide a loose theme for each anthology we are also looking for Researchers to create or share content on the latest advances in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics). This acting as the bridge of inspiration, between Science Fiction and Science Fact.

You don’t have to be a ‘Scientist’ to provide STEM Inspiration on our public community, so don’t be put off by that. Share anything cutting edge in those fields and we will be happy. However if you are knowledgeable in STEM and are willing to submit your articles to us for inclusion, we would be prepared to consider doing an additional anthology, a Google+ STEM Journal if you will.

I recently had the pleasure of having my science fiction short story ‘The Cancer’reviewed by +Charles Strebor on Google+ It was a wonderful boost and it prompted me to do something I had been meaning to do for a while, which was to update the cover (see above) and a few other details.

I’ve been trying to get the discount option working on the new version as well, but it doesn’t seem to want to work so I’ve reduced the price by over a third instead. (I only wish cutting the cancer rate were so easy.)

Unfortunately when I updated the project on Lulu I managed to lose my only other review. Therefore I would love to hear what you think of the story and the new cover (which I put together myself). Feel free to comment on this blog or on Lulu if you can. I really appreciate your feedback 🙂

So far things have been a little slow on the publishing front of Hermit Studio right now as the main focus is being put into the games and photography projects scheduled (as our first major publishing project will an an annual anthology). This week however Niamh Brown, a member of Hermit Studio, received a gift of a collection of comments handwritten in ink in a leather bound book from the good people at bhuman.co.uk This was for donating her story to them for their anthology of stories of courage for people in hard times. Niamh has been seriously writing for over a decade now and although she has written online for five years this will be her first time in print once the book is released and donated to those in need.

For more details and pictures of the comments book Niamh received or to read her story go here: http://goo.gl/Hvxt5